Taiwan wheat sale OK'd

A document indicating Taiwan's desire to purchase more than 62 million bushels of Kansas hard red winter wheat was signed Friday by state officials and members of a Taiwanese trade delegation.

The signing of the "memorandum of understanding" took place in the Kansas Senate chamber shortly before noon.

State officials say the sale, to take place in 2010 and 2011, will be worth $425 million.

The document was signed by Shao-Fu Hung, executive director of the Taiwan Flour Mills Association and head of the Taiwanese delegation, and Justin Gilpin, chief executive officer of Kansas Wheat, a collaboration of the Kansas Wheat Commission and the Kansas Association of Wheat Growers.

After the ceremony, Gilpin explained the memorandum of understanding contains little in the way of details. Things such as actual purchase amounts and prices will be set by subsequent legal documents.

"It's basically a goodwill document -- they are not writing us a check today," Gilpin said.

The whole event was full of goodwill. State officials and the Taiwanese delegation took turns praising each other.

State officials present included Gov. Mark Parkinson, Commerce Secretary David Kerr, Kansas Agriculture Secretary Josh Svaty and members of the Kansas Legislature, including Senate President Steve Morris and House Speaker Mike O'Neal.

One theme repeated by speakers was the quality of Kansas wheat.

"Taiwan is one of the most quality-conscious markets in the world," Gilpin said.

Jacqueline H. Liu, director general in the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Kansas City, received the only spontaneous applause in the room when she said: "Kansas state produces the best wheat in the world. Certainly we will come back again and again."

Following the signing ceremony, the Taiwanese group was to tour facilities in Manhattan and Salina and Kansas Wheat commissioner Steve Clanton's farm in Ottawa County.

The last memorandum of understanding with Taiwan was signed in 2003. Taiwan was the 16th-largest market for Kansas products in 2008, according to Kansas Department of Commerce figures supplied to the media Friday.

Since 1998, Taiwan has imported 399 million bushels of wheat from the United States, worth $2 billion.

Kansas, known as "The Wheat State," continues to lead the country in wheat production.

The 2009 Kansas wheat crop covered 8.8 million acres and yielded 369.9 million bushels, for an average yield of 42 bushels per acre.

Mike Hall can be reached at (785) 295-1209 or mike.hall@cjonline.com

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